Ritz San Jose

Put THIS one down as closed but definitely not demolished! The marquee still stands as well as the stage where the screen was at South 1st and San Salvador. Drinks are a little pricey but it for the seniors at SJSU! Huge DJ booth a plus! From porn to rock bands. Only in San José! 🤩🤩😍😍

Interesting that the newest incarnation of the theatre/club is called Ritz. For a very brief time in the 1920s, a little further down the same block, there actually was a small movie theatre in operation called the Ritz. During my research for my book, Theatres of San Jose, I only found it listed in the City Directory for a few years, and never found any photos of it. I went to where the address number should have been, but all the buildings at that point in the block are so thoroughly remodeled, it was impossible to find any building that could have been the old Ritz.

The Gay Theatre was opened a year earlier than the intro currently says. Boxoffice of May 1, 1948, said that Bert Kennerson’s new Gay Theatre at San Jose would be ready to open about June 1. Boxoffice of July 10 said the house had opened, that the $55,000 house seated 600, and that its opening had brought the total number of theaters operating in San Jose to twelve.

New book-length Pussycat Theatre history from the San Diego Reader:
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Vince Miranda was my God father.He was NOT married to Rosemary Clooney!! However, he was very good friends with Rosemarie (The Dick Van Dyke Show).She was a great family friend. It was printed in some gossip rags like Rona Barrett’s that they were dating. That too is untrue.Although…they both went on the Mike Douglas show and stated otherwise.
He was a great guy , and I miss him very much.I have been putting together a collection of pussycat memorbilia…if any of you out there have any photos, letters , or even storys..Please let mr know.

Tim David

This theater was raided in July 1973 for showing Deep Throat after a judge’s order in which the theater was ordered not to show it for reasons of obscenity.

To my knowledge, neither Dan Sonney, Dave Friedman(original Pussycat founders) nor Vince Miranda(who owned the chain most of its life) were related by blood or marriage to Rosemary Clooney.

I saw ‘Deep Throat’ at the Pussycat in 1973. We had a field trip from the San Jose' State drama department: ‘Bring your own trench coat and slouch hat.’ We also brought black strips of paper to obscure our eyes in photographs in case of a raid (a la ‘Confidential’ and other old Hollywood scandal rags).

The Gay showed arthouse fare until the late 1960’s, when it had switched to adult fare. Shaw Theaters ran it until about 1970, when Pussycat took over. (It was called the Pussycat II, the Pussycat I was the Camera One theater, which Pussycat operated in 1970-1971 after acquiring it from Shaw.) The city of San Jose had its share of battles with Pussycat (which included a July 1973 raid during a showing of Deep Throat as well as a late 1980’s lawsuit initiated by Pussycat over San Jose’s downtown revitialization). Pussycat gave up in 1989.